


elaeomyxa cerifera

by treefrogie84



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Eldritch Bunker - Freeform, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:34:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21835252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/treefrogie84/pseuds/treefrogie84
Summary: It starts small, and well before the solstice. Feeding is its most vulnerable time, and it’s not stupid. Having watched dozens of its siblings die, it knows the things to avoid. Move too fast, get too greedy, and pay the price. Slow is the only way forward.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14
Collections: SPNColdestHits





	elaeomyxa cerifera

**Author's Note:**

> so... despite this being my choice for theme, i had zero ideas. So enjoy the slime mold.

It starts small, and well before the solstice. Feeding is its most vulnerable time, and it’s not stupid. Having watched dozens of its siblings die, it knows the things to avoid. Move too fast, get too greedy, and pay the price. Slow is the only way forward.

The days grow shorter and it grows fat off the yellow sulfuric dust the parasites track in. Even when the dust explodes, sudden veins appearing throughout the rhizome and allowing it to absorb as much as it can, it moves slowly to avoid attracting the attention of the parasites.

It grows towards the warm dark, the cold of the surface directing it upwards, into the dark stillness of the buildings surrounding it. The sulfur is weaker here, contaminated, but still present, still feeding it, even after all these cycles.

Carefully, it stretches and resettles, trying to take advantage of the new food supply, threading roots down and over, reaching into the rich bedrock of sulfur, greedily sucking it up.

Briefly, it withdraws, wary of overfeeding or a trap like what killed so many of its siblings, but nothing has changed-- the parasites are near enough, but not inside and…

They are bringing other things-- _dead_ things-- inside. Dead things, to rot and spread their diseases throughout its structure. The parasites have done this before, but small amounts-- supplemental feeding. Not this, whatever this is. 

It shudders and shakes, forces the excess material back out of its structure. Whatever the parasites are doing, they can do it _elsewhere_. They make some noise, angry vibrations throughout the structure, but easily ignorable.

It settles back into itself, no longer feeding-- the solstice is over, the time for food over, the long hunt for another of its kind begun-- and allows the parasites back in. It will soon be far too preoccupied to fuss about their peculiar habits.

**Author's Note:**

> [elaeomyxa cerifera ](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-26/slime-mould-tasmania-fungi-hunting/10554338) is a Tasmanian slime mold. Title picked entirely because it's pretty. 


End file.
